Eckstein Kathrin N, Rosenbaum David, Camera Anna, Röhrig Lisa, Herrmann Matthias L, Wildgruber Dirk
Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Tübingen Center for Mental Health (TüCMH), University of Tübingen, Tübingen, Germany.
Clinic for General Psychiatry and Psychotherapy, Zentrum für Psychiatrie (ZfP), Klinikum am Weissenhof, Weinsberg, Germany.
Sci Rep. 2025 Jul 22;15(1):26669. doi: 10.1038/s41598-025-10439-7.
Feelings of external influence are a hallmark of psychotic disorders, but mitigated forms can also be observed in healthy persons. A newly developed paradigm designed to induce feelings of external influence through verbal information (influence will be attempted/not-attempted) and physical setup (presence of tDCS-device or hand touch) was carried out in a pilot study in 21 patients with psychosis and in 22 healthy controls. A higher prevalence of induced feelings of external influence was observed in patients with psychosis. Furthermore, in healthy controls the impact of verbal information outweighed the impact of physical setup, whereas in patients the setup had a stronger influence. Moreover, the intensity of induced feelings of external influence correlated with measures of psychotic symptom severity (PANSS positive score, SAPS, AMDP ego-disorder) as well as response latencies during the estimation process. These findings indicate that feelings of external influence can be reliably induced in healthy controls and in patients with psychotic disorders. Stronger effects of physical setup in patients might be related to disorder-specific biases regarding the impact of initial perceptual impressions of features of the physical environment on belief formation, whereas the attenuated response to explicit verbal information about attempted influence might reflect reduced trust in other people's statements.
受外部影响的感觉是精神障碍的一个标志，但在健康人身上也能观察到程度较轻的形式。在一项针对21名精神病患者和22名健康对照者的初步研究中，采用了一种新开发的范式，通过言语信息（将尝试施加影响/不尝试施加影响）和物理设置（经颅直流电刺激设备的存在或手部触摸）来诱发受外部影响的感觉。在精神病患者中观察到诱发的受外部影响感觉的发生率更高。此外，在健康对照者中，言语信息的影响超过了物理设置的影响，而在患者中，物理设置的影响更强。此外，诱发的受外部影响感觉的强度与精神病症状严重程度的测量指标（阳性和阴性症状量表阳性评分、精神症状评定量表、精神科综合评定量表自我障碍部分）以及估计过程中的反应潜伏期相关。这些发现表明，在健康对照者和精神病患者中都能可靠地诱发受外部影响的感觉。患者中物理设置的更强影响可能与关于物理环境特征的初始感知印象对信念形成的影响的特定障碍偏差有关，而对关于尝试施加影响的明确言语信息的反应减弱可能反映出对他人陈述的信任降低。
